Hyderabad: 1,800 acres lie unused as TG, AP fight it over in court

Hyderabad: Over 1,800 acres of land belonging to Deccan Infrastructure and Land Holdings Limited (DILL), a company owned by the Telangana Housing Board, have remained unutilised and prone to encroachments as the governments of Telangana and Andhra Pradesh are locked in a legal dispute over its ownership.

The state government has recently decided to fence the land holdings by spending Rs 25 crore. Chief Minister A. Revanth Reddy and housing minister Ponguleti Srinivas Reddy decided to get the areas surveyed with the help of DGPS (differential global positioning system) and boundary pillars built.

If the issue was settled, 1,821 acres of land can be used to construct houses for people, who are finding it tough to purchase a house in Hyderabad.

DILL was formed by the Y.S. Rajasekhar Reddy government to facilitate taking up of joint venture projects under the PPP (public private partnership) model. It was registered under the Companies Act and land belonging to the Housing Board was transferred to it with 56 per cent share for it and the state government gave land for its 44 per cent portion.

The land parcels belonging to the state government, it is said, were given in lieu of the Rs 2,416 crore taken from the board to mobilise funds for the Jalayagnam scheme of the Rajasekhar Reddy government.

After the formation of Telangana state, the BRS government took back the land parcels which were part of the DILL. The Telangana Housing Board has contended that the status of land should be decided based on location. Ninetyfive per cent of the board’s lands are in Telangana. The AP government has on its part contended that it should get 52 per cent of the share of land value as per the AP Reorganisation Act.

Pending resolution of the dispute, the board is footing the bill on payment of pension amounting to Rs 2 crore on employees hailing from Andhra Pradesh as per the directions of the AP High Court.

In its common order dated February 20, 2020, it was held that liability to pay full pension and pensionary benefits to all the retired employees rested with the Telangana Housing Board and should be borne by it exclusively as long as it retained exclusive control over 96 per cent of moveable and immoveable assets belonging to the erstwhile APHB and enjoy its income.